Comets summary

Published 5:30 am, Sunday, July 22, 2001

Help wanted

Comets coach Van Chancellor, hoping to come up with another consistent offensive threat, has been trying to work a trade before the midnight Monday deadline.

Chancellor has been talking to Phoenix and Detroit among other teams, but so far he has come up empty.

Chancellor will be burning up the phone lines again today.

"(It's) no different from any other day," Chancellor said Saturday. "You get up in the morning as the general manager of the Comets looking to see if there's any possibility that you can better your basketball team.

"The plight of our team, in my mind, we've had to deal with a schedule that's been unbearable, (and) you have the suspension of a player (Tina Thompson). All we need to do is get back home. We're going to be fine."

The Comets end a season-long six-game road trip Monday night at Minnesota before returning to Houston to face the Utah Starzz at Compaq Center on Tuesday night.

Shakirova OK

Center/forward Elena Shakirova suffered a blow to the nose in the second half of Friday night's game at Miami and was limited to 13 minutes of playing time.

Coach Van Chancellor said it was feared at first Shakirova had broken her nose and might be sidelined for an unspecified time.